The Dark Pictures Anthology: Man of Medan

 PlayStation 4
User Score
5.8

Mixed or average reviews- based on 516 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 139 out of 516
  2. Mixed: 233 out of 516
  3. Negative: 144 out of 516
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  1. Skulky
    May 29, 2020
    3
    Man of Medan is a huge step backwards from the incredible experience that Until Dawn gave us. Until Dawn gave us characters we loved (and hated), a gripping and intense story with plenty of terror and suspense built in. Man of Medan gave us 2-3 hours of bland characters, basically no story, and cheesy jump scares. Not mention that the game was riddled with technical and graphical bugs atMan of Medan is a huge step backwards from the incredible experience that Until Dawn gave us. Until Dawn gave us characters we loved (and hated), a gripping and intense story with plenty of terror and suspense built in. Man of Medan gave us 2-3 hours of bland characters, basically no story, and cheesy jump scares. Not mention that the game was riddled with technical and graphical bugs at release. The only reason I gave this game a 3/10 is because of the co-op feature, which was genius.

    It seems appropriate that the second game in the Dark Pictures Anthology is called "Little Hope". Because that is what I have for this series after Man of Medan.    … Expand
  2. CoreGamer1408
    May 21, 2020
    7
    Ok getting the bad out of the way some infrequent performance issues with frame rate and some really bad facial uncanny valley moments. The scares were cheap, but still very effective. I liked the cheesy horror style and I was really creeped out in a lot places. Very basic game play mechanics as in move here, look at this, do some QTE. The focus of this experience is the characters and theOk getting the bad out of the way some infrequent performance issues with frame rate and some really bad facial uncanny valley moments. The scares were cheap, but still very effective. I liked the cheesy horror style and I was really creeped out in a lot places. Very basic game play mechanics as in move here, look at this, do some QTE. The focus of this experience is the characters and the story with game play taking a back seat for sure. A short game, but I believe it has up to nine endings. So yeah lots of replay for all those ending unlocks. First run nobody died, but the optional choice of asking the Curator for clues really helped.… Expand
  3. Milidante
    May 3, 2020
    7
    The game have some potential to be better than this but developers did not use that. I think little hope could do better if super massive take care of some issues.
  4. Menni
    Apr 27, 2020
    8
    Non complesso come Until Dawn ma giustificato sin dall'inizio dalla differenza di prezzo di listino fra i due. Storia interessante e rigiocabile, modalità co-op sia locale che online (nonostante i problemi di quest' ultima) davvero gradite, anche per il fatto che é abbastanza possedere una sola copia per giocare entrambi. Troppi bug grafici e ritmi di gioco un po' lenti
  5. Danielglencer
    Sep 13, 2019
    5
    The game has a lot of potential but a lot of bugs and frame rate drops get in the way
    Walking around feels somewhat akward and not entirely responsive and the QTE's are ridiculously hard to nail which is a shame, feel like not enough testing was done to determine the right intervals to make some QTE's humanly possible
    I wish Supermassive Games would have put in the extra effort to make a    The game has a lot of potential but a lot of bugs and frame rate drops get in the way
    Walking around feels somewhat akward and not entirely responsive and the QTE's are ridiculously hard to nail which is a shame, feel like not enough testing was done to determine the right intervals to make some QTE's humanly possible
    I wish Supermassive Games would have put in the extra effort to make a truly unique game work flawlessly    … Expand
  6. Bruno2K
    Apr 19, 2020
    4
    Ótimos gráficos, porem alguns glitches, historia muito curta comparado a outros jogos com until dawnn, life is strange, o enredo é mal explicado e o final deixa muita coisa em aberto, sem falar no preço alto que não corresponde com o jogo
  7. yugimacdow
    Apr 6, 2020
    6
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Not even close to being as good as Until Dawn. I waited for a sale on this game, got it for 20$ and still feel ripped off. The story is really cliche and obvious and also the dialogue is really simple. Choices do matter a lot tho maybe even more than Until Dawn. The game is only 4 hours. At least they got some sort of coop. The ending wasn't good at all. The quick time events are pretty cool. I didn't trust the reviews and honesty get it if it's on sale at like 10$.… Expand
  8. Descole
    Apr 6, 2020
    7
    Its a funny game. Izs quite short and not as good as until dawn but its fine. For 30 bucks its absolutely fine
  9. Aeolian
    Apr 5, 2020
    7
    It's not as good as Until Dawn, but it still offers a chilling experience. The dialog sometimes feels a bit off, character reactions are not quite what you would expect, but it still delivers a twisted story line with moments that will have you scratching your head. Sound design was good, graphically, kind of low budged compared to their previous title, characters, not so memorable. It wasIt's not as good as Until Dawn, but it still offers a chilling experience. The dialog sometimes feels a bit off, character reactions are not quite what you would expect, but it still delivers a twisted story line with moments that will have you scratching your head. Sound design was good, graphically, kind of low budged compared to their previous title, characters, not so memorable. It was a good play. I'm looking forward to the next title.… Expand
  10. Jonneeyy
    Mar 30, 2020
    8
    Gruseliges Horrorabenteuer, welches vor allem mit Atmosphäre und dem Drang die Charaktere am Leben zu halten besticht.
  11. berkae
    Mar 18, 2020
    3
    I was really hyped for the game before it was released and I got it during the premiere. Unfortunately after one couch-play I was so disappointed I left the game somewhere in my PS4 library for quite some time.
    After about half a year later I gave it a try and I finished it twice - solo and on Curator's mode and all I can say it's extremely decent game in all of it's aspects.
    I was    I was really hyped for the game before it was released and I got it during the premiere. Unfortunately after one couch-play I was so disappointed I left the game somewhere in my PS4 library for quite some time.
    After about half a year later I gave it a try and I finished it twice - solo and on Curator's mode and all I can say it's extremely decent game in all of it's aspects.
    I was playing on my PS4 Slim, and the game crashed at least twice during one walkthrough. The graphics was loading during the cutscenes, so the whole visual experience was gone. The game is also really dark, and sometimes I had trouble to find the right way (or maybe it's because the handling is terrible here). The ocean view was just a disaster, because I never had the whole assets loaded in time, so it looked like a bad 2005 game.
    The story is not scary at all and it's not so interesting, although the Medan theme was good (and ship part is quite ok). I wasn't felt anything more than boredom during walkthrough, because even the jump scares were predictable. There's also a problem with choices, how everything is connected and why if I chose one option it led me to something so not connected that in some point I wasn't even trying to think as a character and I was just picking heart (1st play) or brain (2nd play) options just for a trophy, because whatever - it doesn't make sense! But there's another thing that was so irritating - the game is slow and short. The first part where you meet your characters takes ages to get through, and when you are on Medan it's about an 1 hour of gameplay! And you can finish the game in like 4 hours!
    I had decent fun playing Until Dawn (the characters were annoying, but that was part of a theme I suppose), so I wasn't expecting much from a characters here, but they were enjoyable. OFC some of the relations were awkward or annoying, and the Junior character was so bad I never tried to rescue him at all, but hey - we all know someone like Junior irl.

    + Theme
    + The Medan part is quite enjoyable
    + Co-op option

    - Choices
    - Glitches, bugs, errors, crashes and really bad optimization
    - It's boring at the beginning and somehow in the middle
    - Really short
    - Handling is terrible!

    Do I recommend this game? Well, as a couch co-op if you can't predict the jumpscares and it's on a big discount - well, sure. Other than that, not really.    … Expand
  12. Kinokee
    Mar 16, 2020
    5
    The story reveals itself before it's half over and the rest of the game loses any sense of horror or tension. There's laggy custscenes in multiplayer. Button prompts don't disappear when you look at items so you have giant x's on your screen. There are giant loading disc symbols that pop in over the whole screen when the game is loading. It's too easy to know what choices to make to notThe story reveals itself before it's half over and the rest of the game loses any sense of horror or tension. There's laggy custscenes in multiplayer. Button prompts don't disappear when you look at items so you have giant x's on your screen. There are giant loading disc symbols that pop in over the whole screen when the game is loading. It's too easy to know what choices to make to not kill anyone and the game shoves the plot twist down your throat a third of the way in so you lose any sort of tension the games first quarter built up. The controls are also clunky and very stiff to move the characters around. Feels rigid like an older PS2 game at some points. Also the QTEs are all laggy which may result in you routing differently which also sucks for a game that's so built on your own choice and path. But now you're stuck going one route or with someone dead because the game can't handle its own quick time events.

    The best thing this game has going for it is the new multiplayer system but I didn't get credit for any of the collectibles I picked up at one point which is total **** for a game that has 50 of those damn things scattered around.    … Expand
  13. ammilner
    Mar 11, 2020
    7
    “Man of Medan” certainly leaves quite the impression for what is to come from the rest of "The Dark Pictures Anthology" (the good parts and the not so good parts). Overall, it’s a very impressive title considering the price point ($30) and the fact that they’re supposedly going to be releasing a new entry into the Anthology twice a year, with the next game “Little Hope” due to come out in“Man of Medan” certainly leaves quite the impression for what is to come from the rest of "The Dark Pictures Anthology" (the good parts and the not so good parts). Overall, it’s a very impressive title considering the price point ($30) and the fact that they’re supposedly going to be releasing a new entry into the Anthology twice a year, with the next game “Little Hope” due to come out in the Spring-ish of 2020, though for anybody who follows gaming and the consistency of developers being inconsistent with their release dates that probably means the Summer or Fall of 2020 more realistically.

    The biggest strength that “Man of Medan” has going for it is that you can actually play it with other people. Multiple characters have been a thing in the past with choice-based games like “Heavy Rain” and “Until Dawn” but this is the first one I’ve really seen (aside the soft-boiled attempt in “Beyond: Two Souls”) to actually bring friends into the mix. For my first play through, I played with a buddy and each of us controlled 3 of the games 6 characters (though it’s really 5 and I got the short end of the stick but I’m not trying to give away too much info here) and it was exactly the kind of experience that I’ve always wanted from a game like this. It’s like having a scary movie night but we were actually engaged instead of just texting on our phones while off-and-on paying attention to “The Cave” (it’s a terrible movie what can I say). Bonus, the multiplayer mode is even called movie night!

    Being able to play through “Man of Medan” with a friend is obviously the intended experience and it’s certainly my recommendation as well. Having to deal with the anxiety that your friend could get both their characters, and even your characters, killed off added a ton to the tension of the game and, because the narrative is meant to be played in one sitting (running only 3-4 hours at most), there wasn’t any room for things to become stagnant. “Man of Medan” is a pretty straight forward horror title, it has it’s fair share of jump scares (some work but a lot fall short too) and the cast is relatively one-dimensional but where “Man of Medan” falls short it makes up for it in replay-ability, variance, and vision.

    If you’ve ever played a choice-based game before, you probably know all too well that the first play through is great and your choices really feel like they matter but the moment you go back for a second time, it becomes pretty easy to see that, while the game might’ve tried to look like there were a lot of options, there’s usually only a few main modules that change outcomes and the rest becomes circumstantial. "Man of Medan" is one of the few games that actually does have more variance after more than one run and while it still does adhere to some choice-based runarounds every now and then, it’s a pretty varied experience. For example, after beating it with my friend and coming away with 4 out of 6 characters alive, I went back in to save everyone and instead, beat it solo with only 3 out of 6 alive. Even though I thought I knew all of the beats, just the act of saving a character that I lost early on in my previous play-through threw enough of the things that I had already experienced on a different path that led me to actually do worse my second time around and that's something very rare to find in replaying anything.

    “Man of Medan” certainly isn’t my game of the year, and it lacks some polish and uniqueness that could’ve made it stand out as more than just a lower priced game to play with your friends on a Friday night but it accomplishes what it set out to do.    … Expand
  14. Gonoru
    Mar 11, 2020
    3
    Weak story and the actors performances and dialogs are even worst. Lots of jump scares...too many
  15. jimmylittle007
    Feb 28, 2020
    2
    Truly a terrible game. Very little actual gameplay, cliche characters with awful personalities that leave you wishing them dead rather than rooting for them to survive. The so called twist is, quite literally, revealed in the prologue about five minutes into the game. Avoid at all costs
  16. apjs
    Feb 26, 2020
    1
    1 point for the general idea of the story. But unfortunately, there are many inconsistencies and plot holes that are not acceptable. Especially towards the end. Feels like the game had to be published in a rush and the story was finished in a hurry.

    But the worst part are the quick time events (QTE). They are ridiculously hard - beyond anything you would expect from Until Dawn for example    1 point for the general idea of the story. But unfortunately, there are many inconsistencies and plot holes that are not acceptable. Especially towards the end. Feels like the game had to be published in a rush and the story was finished in a hurry.

    But the worst part are the quick time events (QTE). They are ridiculously hard - beyond anything you would expect from Until Dawn for example - and failing even a single one can kill one of the characters. This is especially bad in a game that allows no manual saving. The game gives an option to „Disable QTE timeouts“ - which is randomly working for like 70% of them. This is extremely frustrating especially since you don’t know in advance which ones are affected and which ones are not.    … Expand
  17. Sathoreal
    Feb 18, 2020
    3
    Очень короткая игра и не страшная. Своих денег не стоит. Я ожидал от него большего, в некоторых сценах (во многих) локации прогружаются прямо на глазах, первая игра вышла намного интереснее и лучше.
  18. Prismagic
    Feb 2, 2020
    0
    No juegues esta cosa, esta de hueva... Personajes e historias super chafa....
  19. PrFrink
    Jan 27, 2020
    8
    A little bit short, but this game has something special. Cannot wait other chapters, with better graphics and longer.
  20. Ward2019
    Jan 16, 2020
    7
    A reskin of Until Dawn. Similar mechanics, still the same jump scares. I enjoyed the story however. I picked it up on sale for 18$. I wouldn’t recommend paying the full retail.
  21. Steyraus
    Jan 6, 2020
    3
    I really liked Super Massives last game Until dawn. Navigating a group of very attractive young people through a horror movie setting, the character were very likable and a couple not so likable, which Made trying to keep them alive or get them killed a really involving adventure..Man of Medan misses nearly every mark the Until dawn hit.. The characters are all unlikable and extremelyI really liked Super Massives last game Until dawn. Navigating a group of very attractive young people through a horror movie setting, the character were very likable and a couple not so likable, which Made trying to keep them alive or get them killed a really involving adventure..Man of Medan misses nearly every mark the Until dawn hit.. The characters are all unlikable and extremely either unattractive or straight up weird looking, meaning I didnt care about them , didnt care if they lived or died, didnt care about their story.
    Also the game is now nearly all cut scenes now, less exploring and player involvement, that coupled with the bad story , bad characters and muddled plot, made this fell like watching one of those horrible b grade horror movies, that somehow keep getting made. Its a grinding, grating experience, irritating characters, dumb jump scares, just stupid plot, no game play, ugos everywhere, it sux.
    Its not even so bad its good, its just dull, and the dialogue , man if how ugly these characters looked didn't make them hard enough to like, when they start talking , that will do it..
    After being completely blown away by how bad this game is, I looked at all the other games these guys have made, and pretty much every game is a stinker, even their VR games were not at all good. Untill Dawn was literally the only game they made that was good..They have been held up by Sony for all these years, and in their arrogance, they split from Sony after their first and only Hit, (Untill Dawn)..
    Now they are back to making stinkers and it makes you wonder how long they can stay a float without Sonys backing. Goes to show, dont get to cocky, and dont crap on a company that has been so good to you, they should have stayed at Sony and made Until Dawn 2, but they thought they had their Golden Goose formula and wanted all the cash to themselves.
    Apparently the want to do 8 of these crappy games over 2 years, so if that dosent break them, nothing will.. I think its time for this long running Studio to be put out to pasture, even when they do finally have a success they mess it up.. Now that takes talent... Anti-talent.    … Expand
  22. HeavyMetalSloth
    Jan 3, 2020
    6
    After playing Until Dawn a couple years ago I was impressed with what Supermassive Games had to offer. So when Man of Medan released I knew I had to get it. After playing and finishing it in solo mode I was disappointed in the story and also how the game abruptly came to an end. This game is meant for co-op as it makes it more enjoyable because I found myself bored towards the end. UntilAfter playing Until Dawn a couple years ago I was impressed with what Supermassive Games had to offer. So when Man of Medan released I knew I had to get it. After playing and finishing it in solo mode I was disappointed in the story and also how the game abruptly came to an end. This game is meant for co-op as it makes it more enjoyable because I found myself bored towards the end. Until Dawn was a way better game than this and I think I replayed UD once or twice, but the chances of me replaying this game is slim to none.… Expand
  23. summerj
    Jan 3, 2020
    5
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Overall I rate this game a 5 out of 10 . I am a youtuber ( ANON GAMES ) and I absolutely loved Until Dawn . The storyline for Until Dawn was absolutely amazing and had shocking endings . For Man Of Medan , the entire storyline was basically founded out by in the beginning of the game when Joe could "see" his son . At the moment , the audience knew that he was hallucinating . The game was very predictable and I thought it would have progressed while the storyline deepened, but neither of those things happened . Also , in my own opinion, you could not get easily attached to any character in the game . The deaths didn't really have a meaningful impact , unlike Until Dawn where you could easily get attached to a character . In the beginning of the game , you had very little small talk with different characters and that's basically all you ever got to know about them . They never gave the characters true meaning to the audience . I had so much potential because the creators are definitely talented, so this is definitely not a hate review . I did really enjoy some aspects of this game . The anxiety this game gives is definitely perfect because it makes the game more thrilling to play . I loved the idea of hallucinations and seeing false objects, that idea was so clever and they truly could have made that idea into something bigger and better . They should have added onto the hallucinations and made a deeper storyline for the game . I also love the new multiplayer option, it really added something new and fun that everyone should try out . I do recommend adding a "split screen" option into multiplayer though because when you play with someone else, you do not get to see the entire storyline because it only will show your own character's storyline , which can really be confusing . I will definitely be playing "Little Hope" and seeing how that game goes . Thank you .… Expand
  24. vanvejar1
    Dec 11, 2019
    3
    pesim juego, disfruto mucho los juegos como peliculas interactivas, until dawn, detroit, heavy rain, y este es lejos el mas deficiente de todos, jugabilidad pesima, historia mediocre, traduccion lamentable, optimizacion horrible.
  25. lucasbutcher
    Dec 4, 2019
    6
    é um jogo gostosinho de se jogar, but, é meio incompetente, recomendo, porem tentem pegar na promoção, usado, ou de graça em algum lugar :)
  26. Gamer1465
    Nov 30, 2019
    5
    This is a disappointing follow up to one of my favorite horror games, Until Dawn although they are not connected it is still developed by the same people.

    The game starts of quite well surprisingly I didn't mind the characters although they are quite shallow. The game also lets it known pretty early what the big evil is and I guessed it in the first 30 minutes and preyed that it would    This is a disappointing follow up to one of my favorite horror games, Until Dawn although they are not connected it is still developed by the same people.

    The game starts of quite well surprisingly I didn't mind the characters although they are quite shallow. The game also lets it known pretty early what the big evil is and I guessed it in the first 30 minutes and preyed that it would have some other twist but no, we are left with an awful evil that is eye rolling. Also all the endings and death scenes are extremely lackluster compared to the absolutely brutal deaths and interesting endings in Until Dawn and your character cannot die unless the game says so, this is also super disappointing. The faces on the characters are also quite bad compared to Until Dawn they look quite hilarious and unreal although the voice acting is top notch. This game also copies a big thing from Until Dawn which is the psychiatrist who talks to you in between chapters which now is sort of feeling old now and hope this psychiatrist is not in the next of the dark pictures games. This game is quite fun with friends who have no clue about the game and see there reactions to the scares or deaths, this will always be a strong point for these games and hope we get more unique experiences like this and until dawn.

    Although this first game in the anthology of dark pictures is disappointing I have much higher hopes for the second one which is going to be a campy slasher which always is a good time, lets hope they go uphill from here.    … Expand
  27. tobivv
    Nov 26, 2019
    6
    It's hard to understand why certain actions lead to certain consequences. Until Dawn's visuals and graphics were incomparable to this game's. Its Movie Night mode redeems it as a local multiplayer experience
  28. draxd2019
    Nov 9, 2019
    2
    I really did not like this game. Horror is based on anoying jumpscares that mostly happen when you try to explore envinroment. Gameplay is based on walking and QTE that really come from nowhere and request fast respond. Graphics and cinematics are really great but game need to have more than that.
  29. Carlospinell
    Nov 8, 2019
    8
    Es un juego bastante corto, unas 4h. La historia tarda en arrancar, aunque luego sea bastante intensa. Los personajes son muy planos y no empatizas con ellos. Tiene problemas de rendimiento, tirones y caidas de frames. Por otra parte, la historia me gustó. Repite los puntos positivos de su predecesor, ya que las deciciones realmente tienen consecuencias futuras, hay varios caminos y seEs un juego bastante corto, unas 4h. La historia tarda en arrancar, aunque luego sea bastante intensa. Los personajes son muy planos y no empatizas con ellos. Tiene problemas de rendimiento, tirones y caidas de frames. Por otra parte, la historia me gustó. Repite los puntos positivos de su predecesor, ya que las deciciones realmente tienen consecuencias futuras, hay varios caminos y se repiten las predicciones, sólo que en este caso el objeto en cuestión son unos cuadros que te vas encontrando. Tiene un apartado técnico excelente. Hago énfasis en el personaje que me parece más interesante del juego, El conservador. En lo único que me ha parecido mejor Man of Medan respecto a Until Dawn es en la atmósfera que se crea entre los personajes cuando estan juntos, ya que me da una mayor sensación de suspense e intriga.
    En conclusión: por su precio y duración, es un juego asequible y recomendable, sobretodo para jugarlo del tirón en una noche con amigos.    … Expand
  30. Bolassen
    Nov 6, 2019
    5
    Some basic horror game with too little story and gameplay. Was expecting much after Until Dawn. This game was disappointing and only somewhat entertaining.
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Awards & Rankings

30
#30 Most Discussed PS4 Game of 2019

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
69

Mixed or average reviews - based on 70 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 29 out of 70
  2. Mixed: 38 out of 70
  3. Negative: 3 out of 70
  1. Carole Quintaine
    Jan 29, 2020
    75
    Even though Man of Medan is far less inspired than its studio predecessor Until Dawn, it offers an enjoyable horrific atmosphere, with good ideas and well thought out sequences. Unfortunately we would have appreciated more surprises and an extended lifespan, which would have given us the time to be really afraid. Everything is going too fast and we have the feeling that the story is sloppy. Too bad because this first chapter of The Dark Pictures has a good potential, but all it does is just scratch the surface.
    Read full review
  2. CD-Action
    Oct 25, 2019
    60
    Supermassive’s newest work is a step back from Until Dawn on every level – including visual design which, though solid, ends up monotonous in comparison. [12/2019, p.58]
  3. Gaming Nexus
    Oct 11, 2019
    70
    Man of Medan starts out well enough but just falls apart towards the end leading up to a pretty anti-climatic ending thanks to a twist that was given away at the very beginning of the story. It's not terrible but it's not nearly as good as Until Dawn. Still, as a fan of Until Dawn, I still enjoyed the story for what it was but I didn't really have a desire to go back and play through it again after finishing it the first time.
    Read full review
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